News - Papers eye Labour conference
Originaly from: News - Papers eye Labour conference page
With evidence to the Hutton inquiry completed, and the Brent East by-election resolved, new battle-lines are being drawn on many of the front pages.
Delegates converging on Bournemouth for the Labour conference are limbering up for what are likely to be bruising confrontations within the party itself.
Health Secretary John Reid tells the Telegraph that those on the Left who don’t want to change are ultimately conservatives.
He says those who consider themselves ideologues are in fact dogmatists.
These sentiments are hardly likely to placate the more hard-line union leaders, some of whom, says the Independent, are trying to force the party’s high command to accept an emergency motion on the war in Iraq.
The paper says that the rail union, the RMT, is putting the conference organisers under enormous pressure to include the proposition.
The Independent predicts that if it makes the order paper, a vote against the government’s policy in Iraq is a virtual certainty.
Two surveys may also cause the prime minister some discomfort as he makes his way to the south coast.
The first, in the Guardian, is of more than 100 Labour backbenchers.
Just over a quarter of those surveyed offered Tony Blair their unconditional support.
But just under a quarter of them told the paper they wanted Tony Blair to stand down.
And in a Mori poll for the Financial Times, 50% of those questioned said they wanted the prime minister to resign.
Endowment misery
The Express reports that one in every four householders is to be hit by what it calls crippling council tax rises.
The paper warns that a nationwide revaluation of home prices will add hundreds of pounds to bills.
And the Daily Mail has more bad news for householders - or more specifically, those with endowment mortgages.
It says many more policy-holders will lose out than previously thought.
The Mail warns that excessive charges imposed by insurers and the deflated stock market have left seven million policies heading for a shortfall.
The situation is described as an outrage by the director of the Consumers’ Association.
Morrison boost
There is widespread support for the Government’s decision to bar Asda, Sainsbury and Tesco from buying their rival, Safeway.
The Sun says the big three have a large enough share already and that competition is good for consumers.
The Mirror says Safeway is now assured of being in safe hands at Morrison.
The Guardian rather more coolly describes the decision as the “least bad of the options considered.”
But it urges the Competition Commission to keep a close eye on the supermarket sector.
Belly up
For the Daily Star, there is no competition for the choice of most important story of the day.
Its front-page enthusiastically proclaims that “Beer won’t give you a belly.”
The Star says scientists used data from nearly 2,000 people in the Czech Republic, which boasts the highest per capita beer consumption in the world.
They concluded there was no direct link between beer consumption and obesity.
And there was even better news for women who drink beer - they tended to weigh less than those who abstain.
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